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Rep. Ed Orcutt (R. 20th) speaks in opposition to HB 2095 before the Washington State House Transportation Committee, Feb 22, 2017, a bill to “develop a process for planning for a new Interstate 5 bridge.”
Likely one of the more sensible and logical comments heard yet.
TVW – House Transportation Committee
The bill passed out of committee by a 14 to 10 vote.
Looks like the zombie is about to crawl out of the grave… The politicians and crony bridge builders are out to rip off Clark County Taxpayers yet again. They’ll certainly push the failed trolley cars on us again… when we’re likely to have far more cost effective auto-drive automobiles (Uber for all) that can pick up commuters (with time-saving routes direct from their homes) and drive them directly to their destination(s) in Portland. The project will likely take 10 years (with all the typical delays) and cost double or triple the original estimates. (Check out multi-billion cost of the new span for the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge. The fast cheap design was rejected by the mayor’s of SF and Oakland as it “had no character” as its design, so an expensive “monumental” bridge was built … opening nearly 30 Years after the 1987 Loma Prieta Earthquake demonstrated that the original span was not safe…
The REAL improvement in Vancouver-Portland cross-river traffic will only come with MORE crossings. Not from forcing expensive, old-fashioned, trolley cars on us…
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Just imagine how well that Waterfront concrete jungle they are building is going to do when potential buyers see they face upwards of 8 years of longer of sitting for hours in massive congestion worse than today in order to access their condos.
Outgoing Vancouver City Councilmember Jack Burkman, a driving force in resurrecting this monster offered his plan for keeping congeestion down during the period.
He claims, “Replacing the current bridges will require two spans, like we have today. We build one that doesn’t affect the current I-5 flow. Then, when it is done we route the I-5 traffic to it, tear down the old spans and build the second span.”
I want to see them build a span alongside the existing span that will not affect traffic.
Between construction equipment and inevitable rubberneckers, it will be a nightmare.
Also forgotten in the quest to once again ignore citizens and rely on the “experts,” wasn’t it the experts of the time that gave us the nightmare we see today?
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Choo Choo. Whom wants to listen to three to five more years about the CRC project that dazzles the minds of a few?
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Well there you have it. Party line votes in the house. It’ll be back from the Senate and they’ll pass it then as amended.
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Haven’t we been through all this already (twice)? There is no change here. The Democrats are simply hiding the fact that they will not approve a 3rd crossing, nor will Democrats or Oregon legislators replace the I-5 span without including light rail. I’m mystified as to why some of the Republicans are getting involved with this.
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I’m left wondering why the powers that be taking it on this time continue to permit Sen. Annette Cleveland to keep making her erroneous claim of the I-5 Bridge is ” a drawbridge, the only one left in our nation on an Interstate highway.
It isn’t, not by a long shot Movable Bridges
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